Farmer Jeans Relaunches With Focus on Tradition, Exclusivity
Farmer Industry is back, and it’s not alone. The denim brand, launched in 2002 by Peter Lang Nooch, is back for Spring 2009 with a new designer, a new cast of executives and two new sister companies that complement the premium-denim brand’s laid-back luxe aesthetic.
Headquartered in Los Angeles’ Lincoln Heights neighborhood, Farmer shares its 5,000-square-foot building with Grey Goods, a new T-shirt blanks and basics brand, and Nakhon, Nooch’s new brand of Thai beer. George King, a partner in the three brands, said the unlikely pairing is proving to be quite complementary. “Jeans, T-shirts and beer. The three actually go together well. They are all part of the same lifestyle, something that is very ’L.A.’,” King said. “There is a certain common thread across all three.” A third partner, Tozar Simich, rounds out the new executive ranks at the company.
Anthony De La Rosa, the brands’ marketing director, said another common thread is a dedication to tradition that informs the three brands. “There are a lot of denim, beer and T-shirt brands out there. But our way is to focus on quality, pay homage to the culture and authenticity of our products.”
As it did when it originally launched, Farmer relaunched at the MAGIC Marketplace in August with men’s jeans targeting denim enthusiasts. “People are obsessive about denim. We’ve taken that trait of collectibility and implemented it into our design,” King said. Designer Jeff Lazaro carefully selects dead-stock fabric, which is used to produce limited runs of jeans made with old-school craftsmanship, three-part construction on the fly, inserted belt loops and pocket lining made from reclaimed fabric. A red gingham tag meanders around a back pocket, changing position every time a new production run of jeans is made. Hardware is classic and clean, but because the brand doesn’t order custom rivets, it changes season to season depending on what Lazaro finds. On-the-floor thread is used to sew Farmer jeans, so the color of the stitching changes batch to batch, adding another dimension of exclusivity. As before, Farmer sews the animal that represents the current year in the Chinese astrological calendar into the waistband of each jean. “These are all details that denim collectors and enthusiasts look for,” Lazaro said.
For Spring 2009, Farmer is limiting its offerings to three men’s silhouettes in raw and rinsed denim and one specialty finish that can be anything from hand-distressing to a spin in a wash house’s waste water, which results in a tough-to-replicate dirty look. Wholesale prices for the line range from $55 for a raw basic jean to $125 for a selvedge version. De La Rosa points out the brand keeps washes and rinses to a bare minimum because Farmer wants the wearer to organically create his own look through natural wear and tear. But, he says, when Farmer does wash or distress its jeans, they do it right. “I saw Peter buy old jeans off a trucker once. He offered him $200 for a pair of jeans that looked like they’d been worn for five years because the whiskering on them was messed-up and real. We’ll take those jeans to the factory and say, ’Make the whiskers look like this.’”
King points out that a lot of the same qualities that make Farmer jeans collectible also make them easy on the environment. “We don’t produce our own denim, pocket lining or hardware. We don’t use harsh washes on the denim. We don’t ship our denim in from across the world. We use local labor. All of this doesn’t make us ’green,’ but it makes us sustainable. We’re not creating unnecessary waste, and that is important to us,” he said. In outfitting their space, King and his associates used reclaimed furniture and energy-efficient fixtures. A couple of company bikes lie around to cut down on driving for local errands. “We try to be realistic and responsible.”
Lazaro, who is working on a women’s denim collection for Summer 2009, said the focus of his design work is to create a quality jean that is true to denim’s traditions and supports Los Angeles. “There are no gimmicks. It’s about making a great, clean pair of jeans for denim connoisseurs and supporting the local economy. We make our jeans in Los Angeles; we buy our denim here,” he said. Another goal for 2009 is to launch a line of contemporary tops to complement Farmer’s jeans. The Japanese market, one of the earliest strongholds for Farmer’s take on premium denim, will be reacquainted with the brand next year when it introduces a collaboration with XLarge, another Los Angeles–based menswear brand with a strong Japanese following.
